An interesting article on textual variants in one of the oldest manuscripts of the Gospels, Vaticanus:
Vaticanus Distigme-obelos Symbols Marking Added Text, Including 1 Corinthians 14.34–5
It covers the old issue of whether Paul’s infamous admonition that women should be “silent” in assemblies of Christians (1 Cor 14:34-35) is actually a later scribal addition. The authors write:
At least sixty-two textual studies argue that 14.34–5 is a later addition. 46 J. Fitzmyer notes that ‘the majority of commentators today’ regard vv. 34–5 as a later addition. 47 K. Haines-Eitzen affirms this of ‘[n]early all scholars now’. 48 Verses 34–5 silence women in church three times without any qualification. Chapter 11, however, guides how women should prophesy, and chapter 14, vv. 5, 24 (3x), 26 and 31 affirm ‘all’ speaking in church. Popular resolutions of this apparent contradiction limit 14.34–5’s demand for silence only to disruptive chatter or, recently contrived, only to judging prophecies. These resolutions should be rejected since they permit speech v. 35 prohibits, namely asking questions from a desire to learn. In light of substantial evidence that vv. 34–5 were originally a marginal gloss and no evidence that any other block of text was added at this gap, 49 these verses are the obvious candidate for the multi-word addition signalled by this distigme plus characteristic bar.
